“Because it is, Evan. This is not new. It has been this way for thousands of years. Now that the blood lines have crossed again it has created a new burden for some to bear. We hate that which we fear. Can you say it isn’t true in your world? It is true for humans, it is true for Wolves and it is true for gadje.” Evan saw the pain and fear in his eyes and knew he was thinking of his own daughter. Katerina showed signs of carrying this burden as well.
“Why is she treated like this but Kira is not?” The question was addressed to anyone who cared to answer him.
“It is just the way it is, Evan. Kira is different. She has earned the respect and admiration of everyone. She has not hidden herself away in a room. She has not buried herself in the sorrow of the curse. It is different because Kira is different.” Alexi looked up at him.
“I must go for a while, Evan. I need to check on Sonya and the children.” Evan may not have been a father but he understood that all of this was making Alexi think of and long to hold, his own daughter. Long to protect her from the judgment of others. The large man let a reluctant smile play on his lips. “Sonya and Katerina will return with me. Sonya will want to see this and I think… Well, I think Katerina needs to see this.” He nodded to the group and left.
Evan was now completely alone with these strangers. He looked over at Emil and thought perhaps he could exchange a few nervous mutual reassurances with the young man. But was stopped by the crackling voice of age.
“Come closer Evan, I’ve a story to tell you.” Elena waved him to her. She was reaching among the many chains and beads that hung from her neck and pulled out a large gold locket. It was at least two inches long and a large oval shape. The front of the locket held a heavy, distinctly shaped piece of amber. She opened it and held it out to him. He moved over and sat next to her on the ground at the end of the log.
Taking the locket from her hands he saw a black and white photo of two women. The photo was grainy and fading. The two women before him were beautiful in very different ways. He saw her first. Kira was smiling back at him. Her hair was pulled up under a cap of some sort and she wore a thick woolen coat over a high necked, long sleeved shirt. She looked just as she had only moments ago.
It was the other woman who let him know this photo was in fact very old. Short shorn ebony hair was just beginning to grow back in and formed a cap of wispy black. Her obsidian eyes seemed dull, sad in a profound way beneath the thick jet brows. Kira’s arm was looped protectively around her shoulder. She wore a dark coat over a dress that was thin and too large. Everything about her seemed too large. Her eyes seemed too large, her bones too large for the thin skin stretched over them. Her cheekbones stood out on her face like a demi-relief carved into the skin. Her collarbones protruded like sharp pointed sticks ready to pierce the flesh.
She looked horrible. This was Elena and she looked as if she had been through hell.
He looked up into the face. “You?”
“Yes. Many years ago now, I was a very young thing. November of 1944.” Her eyes misted over and the sad, haunted look of the woman in the picture touched her face. When she spoke her voice sounded older and more tired. “What do you know of history, Evan?”
“I’m a bit of an academic, Elena. My parents were academics. I know probably more than most.” He watched her face clear and she looked sharply at him.
“Not the history of your magic, your mage’s world, Evan. Real history. The history of those of us who live in the real world.” This was twice since he had arrived that someone had referred to the mage world as something that was not the “real” world. Kira had done it that first day.
“Obviously not as much as you feel I should know.” He gave her a self-deprecating smile.
“You know the story of the mage Vadim Wyton. The man was a monster. No better than that puppet of his, the one he used to put a face on his machinations, the one he used to woo the masses. The one they called Hitler.” Elena reached for the locket. She hooked a small indentation with her nail and the picture flipped forward on a hinge. On this side was a picture cut from paper, it was yellowed and crinkled, crumbling at the edges. It was the blurry image of a man with long curling hair and clear light eyes. The face smiled gently and warmly. Evan recognized it immediately. Vadim Wyton. The man he now knew to have been born a Dracul, to have suffered the werewolf’s curse and to have overcome it by the blood of others. Kira’s history lesson had only added more to the knowledge that Wyton was more than just a rogue dark mage, he was the devil himself.
He looked up at Elena, puzzled. “Why? Why would you carry this with you?”
“To remind myself what evil looks like. That it can come dressed in the guise of a friend, in the image of beauty, elegance and charm. Satan, Lucifer was beautiful—the angel of light, did you know?”
Evan shook his head.
“Yes. Lucifer was one of God’s favorites, the Prince of Light, the Morning Star.” Her face darkened and then cleared. She turned back to the picture of the two girls. “But you want to know about this picture, yes?”
He smiled at her. “Yes, tell me about this picture.”
“Vadim Wyton was the first curse wolf. There was no record among the blood Wolves of this ever having happened before. Stories existed of werewolves, of human beings being bitten and transforming but no record of it ever being orchestrated has been found.” She was looking at the images in the photograph.
“I know,” Evan interrupted gently. “Kira’s told me about him, about her grandfather. Told me he used the war and the things happening to cover experiments he was performing on normal humans, those who are not mages.”
“He also used it to cover his attempts to annihilate the curse wolf.” Her voice was hard and bitter. “He feared us. If he could transition what would stop others from doing so? Others from gaining his power and Evan, my boy, the fusing of the two natures created power as our world had never seen. Wyton used the places the people called the camps to cover what he was doing. Curse wolves were rounded up and sent to one of the camps. Auschwitz-Berkenau. It was called a labor camp. Behind the scenes, hidden even from the German soldiers, was the extermination of, and experimentation on, the curse wolf.”
“You ended up in that place didn’t you?” Evan questioned softly. He did remember hearing about what happened in those places. That wasn’t just normal humans’ history, it was mage history as well. All of his kind knew the stories of Wyton and how he fed the fear and prejudice of a small group of humans to turn on one another. Eventually, he had reasoned, they would destroy each other. He had not heard the stories about the involvement of the werewolves.
“Yes, Evan,” she said, looking over his head as if she saw something no one else did. “The Roma were also targeted. We were rounded up and sent to the camps as undesirables. We thought we would be safe. We lived in the shadow of the great house. We were people of the wolf. We thought we would be safe and in fact, Wyton had assured us we would be. He would never let them touch the Wolves and in the eyes of this family that included us. We believed him because we wanted to and because we had to. The alternative was unthinkable.”
She broke her vacant stare and looked at him. “When we were taken, that is when the family learned what he was doing. That’s when they learned about the planned blood purification. Her grandfather was a powerful man. One with great plans and schemes. He could not become Alpha, that would never be accepted, so he did not challenge his brother-in-law. No, instead it seemed that fate was interceding on his behalf. His child would be Alpha one day. His brother-in-law’s children seemed to be fated to die in infancy. It was long suspected that he was involved but the deaths were so random, so reasonable that it seemed paranoia to believe him responsible. Besides, he was so ingratiating, so charming.”
She sat silent for a moment and seemed distracted by the sight of Sasha leaving one of the wagons and hurrying away. She sighed. “Evan you asked why it is different for Kira. Why people overlook her curse and yes, I know that t
o you it is no curse,” she added quickly raising her hand when he would have interrupted her in protest. “You asked why she is different from Sasha. This is why.” She motioned with the hand that held the locket. “This picture was taken the day after Kira risked everything to get me out. To get us all out.”
An overwhelming sense of pride filled him and he felt his back straighten, his eye sharpen. Kira, his Kira had been brave. She had risked herself for her friend. “I would have expected nothing less of her,” he replied quietly, looking at Elena with somber eyes. “How could she do anything less?”
“A great many blood Wolves did a great deal less, Evan.” The edge in the voice was crisp and sharp. “A great many mages did a great deal less. Most considered that by ridding the world of the werewolf he was doing them a great favor. They knew nothing then and most know nothing now, about the Family.”
Evan nodded. He hadn’t even heard the rumor of these people until he was approached by Ryder to find them.
“She risked more than you could understand. She acted without her Alpha’s permission against her own grandfather. She could have been culled. Culled, Evan. Do you understand that? Do you understand the risk?”
“I understand she could have been forced from the family.”
Elena shook her head. “Evan, culling isn’t equal to being disowned. To be culled is to be killed. To be eliminated from the bloodline of the family.”
Evan jerked his head up and looked at Elena’s face. Culled meant being killed? How casually he had heard Kira and Alexi speak the word. Alexi had mused that Nico could be in danger of culling. Kira told him that his attack nearly caused Alexi to be culled. That she told her father he would have to cull her too. The conversation with her mother came back. “Cull me if you will…”
Sweet mercy! Would she really have risked that for him? His mind was still processing the information when Elena continued with her story.
“Kira, Alexi and his mate Sonya found us and they got us out. All of us, Evan. Kira nearly got herself killed because she wouldn’t leave anyone behind. She insisted they get those in the ‘hospital’ out as well. They’d sawed off the leg of one of the young men. Vadim Wyton wanted to see if it would grow back at the next moon or if he would become a three-legged wolf. Alexi carried him on his back for miles. We were almost caught at one point. We had hidden on a train. The soldiers were searching for escaped prisoners. That’s all they knew us to be.”
Elena pointed Evan to a man sitting with Emil and several other young men. He was very old, possibly older than Elena herself. He had only one leg from the thigh down. “My Marcel. My husband.” She smiled wickedly at Evan. “Why we are not both dead, I do not know. Seventy-nine years old, now Evan. Marcel is seventy-five. It has been a good life, not as long as a mage but for one like us, one whose body is twisted and tortured once a month, it is not so bad.”
Evan shifted uncomfortably. “Elena…it is usually the heart is it not?”
“Yes, Evan. We can live healthy lives and are strong and powerful but age catches us. Eventually my heart will not cooperate with the transformation. I have never known one like us to die unless murdered or transforming.” She reached down and patted his shoulder. “With your mage blood you have a good sixty years before you need to worry, my boy. That is plenty of time for any one life.”
Sixty years would be a mere drop in the ocean that was Kira’s life. “Sixty years sounds so long, yet not long enough. Not for some things,” Evan was saying when he heard a familiar voice call out.
“Where is the music? Are we not to celebrate? Is this not to be a happy event?” Alexi stood at the edge of the clearing with his wife and daughter. But it was the figure that stood several feet behind them that caught Evan’s eye.
Nico.
Nico had come.
Circle of Wolves
Chapter Sixteen
Everything He’s Always Wanted
With Alexi’s arrival the mood swung upward. The musicians began to toy with their instruments and music began to fill the air. Alexi reintroduced Evan to Sonya.
“We are here as your family, Evan,” she said in her thickly accented English. “It is sad that you should be alone today of all days.”
Evan smiled gently at her. Her white blond hair and deep blue eyes gave away her Nordic ancestry. “I’m not alone, Sonya. My friends are with me in a way, even if they don’t know it. I see them in Alexi, he has Seth’s humor and Marcus’… Well, let’s just say they are both certain that they are right. Always. In every situation. Without fail.” His laugh had begun to invade his voice.
Sonya laughed softly, “That sounds about right.” She gave Alexi a friendly poke with her elbow.
“And you make me think of Arianna, Seth’s wife. Like you and Alexi, if ever there was a woman who could handle those two it is Arianna.”
Sonya smiled gently at him. “No wonder she adores you, so sweet.”
“Ah, stop fussing,” Alexi grouched, in false irritation. “After tonight he’ll never be alone again. No matter how much he might wish it.” The scowl broke into a grin and he received another sharp jab to the belly.
Evan let their laughter run its course before he interjected. “Alexi, why is Nico here? Of everyone, I thought for sure he would refuse to come.”
“I honestly have no idea.” Alexi shook his head. Evan followed his eyes to the youngest Gregoravitch male who was standing talking to a couple of boys who seemed close to his age. “He hasn’t said a word. He simply followed us down here. Perhaps I’m being too optimistic but maybe he just couldn’t let his stupidity go so far as to exclude him from this event.”
Not even Alexi seemed convinced by his own words.
Sonya took Katerina and joined the women. Alexi and Evan moved to join a group of men who were creating careless, playful tunes on the instruments that had been unearthed. The instruments were worn and well used but also well cared for and watching them cradled in the hands of the men, it was clear that they were well loved. The cimbalom produced sounds that could have been the most joyful of angels’ plucking. It was truly infectious and Evan found he couldn’t remain seriously worried about Nico.
When a smile finally broke across his face and he heard his own laugh vie with Alexi’s for volume, one of the older men caught his eye and winked. The man was thin with wiry gray hair, he had a violin tucked up under his chin and was playing a song that made Evan’s limbs ache to respond. The old man laughed.
“The werewolf can’t resist the pull of the violin, young one,” he cackled. “They hunted us this way, you know. Believed we could not stop ourselves, if we danced, we died.”
“That’s a myth,” Evan chuckled. The aching in his limbs growing stronger, his hand unconsciously pounding out a beat on his thigh. It was a myth…wasn’t it?
“Is it?” the old man grinned. “We shall see. We shall see.”
A sudden rumble caught the attention of the group. Headlights of an automobile swung across the clearing. A truck pulled up alongside the wagons next to the ancient motor vehicle that belonged to the group. This shiny black arrival opened its door and out stepped Stanislav Gregoravitch. “American,” Evan heard one of the youngest men murmur as he stared at the truck in admiration.
The very new model utility vehicle was impressive. More impressive was that to bring it here, to the backwoods along the Hungarian-Romanian border, even he realized would be extremely expensive. The image of the necklace he had placed on Kira’s neck tickled his brain. The coins had been thick and heavy, gold and of an unrecognized currency. Alexi was striding toward his father who was being joined by several others now coming from the woods. Most of the people Evan had met the day they helped build the small addition were filling the clearing. Curse wolves every one.
A smooth voice whispered in his ear. “Obscenely.”
“What?” Evan turned and was looking at the face of the enigmatic Zev. The man did not seem the sort to be present at a gathering such as this.
“The answer to the question in your head is obscenely. Of course, beyond anything you can imagine will work as well.” An eyebrow rose up over the green eyes.
“Answer to what question?” Evan thought he knew. He hadn’t actually formed the query in his mind yet but it was lurking.
“How rich are they?” Zev looked away from him to the two men examining the contents of the bed of the truck. “Has no one told you?”
“I knew they were involved in commerce…” Evan let his voice trail off hoping the blood Wolf would provide the answers. He didn’t. He gave a twisted smile and stepped away from him toward the truck.
“Let’s have a hand here,” Alexi’s voice called to the men. Evan stepped forward to help unload the vehicle but was stopped by Alexi. “Not you, Romeo. You have a wedding to prepare for.” Evan caught a quick look at the cargo and saw it loaded with cases of wine and enormous amounts of food.
“Come on, little friend,” Alexi motioned him away. He grabbed a bag from the front of the truck and tossed it to Evan. “Kira’s not the only one who needs to get changed.”
Alexi led him to one of the wagons. He paused to tell Evan to undress before grabbing a pitcher from a tabletop and disappearing. He returned a moment later and poured water into a basin. “Wash up.”
Evan pulled off his shirt and leaned over. The water was surprisingly cold as it hit his face and neck. He shivered slightly as it splashed across his chest. Alexi was thrusting a towel in his hands. As he moved the thick cloth across his chest and arms, drying off the straying drops of moisture that clung to the soft hair and threatened to slide down the defined abdomen and soak the waistband of his pants, Alexi was pulling clothing out of the bag. Evan groaned. Alexi had already proven he had no concept of what size he was. This wasn’t going to be good but at least he did have his focus stone back. He’d use it this time if he had to, no way was he going out there looking like a scarecrow.
Circle of Wolves Page 22
